Sleepless in Chicago

To date, the greatest scientific minds in the world are still unsure as to why humans need sleep to function. Ants, for instance, do not sleep. Instead they simply stay stationary as a way to relax. An individual ant is only moving and doing the work for the anthill 20% of the time. The other eighty is spent staying still, but they never actually enter an unconscious state. Don't ask me how an Entomologist can measure the conscious state of a ant, I just repeat the random knowledge I acquire in my life. The particular fact of never sleeping was given to me at the end of a Nickelodeon commercial when I was ten. The percents on the ant activity was found out during one of those timed reading test practice ACT articles. It wasn't a question on the test, but I remember being interested on that paragraph.
     Last night, I went to bed at around 3:30. I had class at 9. Now before you start to get upset (mom), I normally sleep 7-8 hours a night. During the last four years of high school, I slept about 5-6 hours a night. At this point, I don't know what to do with all my extra sleep. I'm taking 17 credit hours this semester and I will start working a few hours a week in the near future. As a result of this surplus sleep, I listened to music  and watched youtube videos with some people until I finally went to sleep. When I did go to sleep, there were still four people awake in my cluster.
     Many people have been complaining about how much less sleep they get in college. I do not have this problem. Victor, as an architect major, sleeps about five hours each night. Last night, he had nearly seven hours of sleep. Good for him. Others, however do not get this sleep normally. I was invited to a Bollywood movie night last night. To give you an idea, they wanted to watch two movies. A short Bollywood movie is still over two hours in length. I was invited twenty minutes before it started. This invite was given at 1:30AM.
     In short, if you ever need to talk someone at anytime of the day or night, it is never too hard to find someone who is up and awake.

There is no such thing as a free lunch

Today's title is a phrase commonly used in economics classes. This phrase comments on how nothing involving physical resources is free. If someone has a "free" lunch consisting of an apple, a PB&J sandwich, and a bag of chips, they must have come from somewhere. It took soil, sun, water, and a lot of time to grow the tree and produce the apple. This is the same case with the grapes to make the jelly. I won't even try to go through the wheat of the bread, the meat, or the potato chips. The point is, resources, time included, are constantly being expended for something "free".
     I bring this up because coldstone had "free" icecream today. The way it was set up, you received a small scoop of their icecream, the flavor of which was chosen by them. There was a guy accepting donations at the front door. He looked somewhat like a bouncer for a club and did not let a soul through until the donation of at least a dollar was made.
     Right now, free scarfs are being given to all UIC students who attend the soccer game tonight. Once admitted to the game, students are given a wristband and will not be given their scarf until the end of the game.

Free Music that isn't also illegal

      I am proud to say that I do not own nor have I ever owned any illegal music. So, there must be an alternative. I frequently visit Youtube for particular songs and constantly listen to Pandora. Most people know what Youtube is at this point. Pandora is an online customizable radio station. You just choose, an artist, a song, or even a genre, and Pandora will begin to play songs based around that selection. Pandora has always had ads to support themselves and to pay off copyrights to their respective artists. The ads and their frequency are beginning to increase, but Pandora is still a great source for free music radio.
     Recently (about 5 hours ago), I have been turned on to a new legal website called Jamendo. The idea is rather new and the website has less than 1 million members. It is so new to the point that spellcheck on my blog is getting upset when I write Jamendo. Jamendo is a free music downloading/ radio website that is free and legal. The only downside is that you probably haven't heard of any of the artists of the 20,000 albums on this website because it mostly new artists that want to spread their music without having to pay a fortune onto the record companies. Jac, at hearing this, said that this was really just another upside. Jamendo allows a new outlet for indie artists to disburse their music. It's rather exciting.

Major Change

I am currently a Chemistry Major. I will soon be a Chemical Engineer Major with a Computer Engineer Minor. Did you know that UIC has a Chemical Engineering Building? I didn't either. It's at the corner of Polk and Clinton and is a good ten minute walk off campus since polk does not run through the Interstate. The staff at the building were very nice, and they are helping me make this transition much easier.
     A chemical engineer is a person who can be brought into almost any line of industry. They can possibly make pharmaceuticals, new paint mixtures, designs for new packaging, or even the food and snack industry. The main goal of any chemical engineer is to take the particular product at hand and redesign it to make it be the highest possible quality for the lowest possible cost.
     This efficiency, which may save as little as one cent per item, makes a big difference. This would essentially mean that for every one million items of said product sold, the company will save around ten thousand dollars. For example, look at a blue M&M. The color of it is slightly lighter in color than the cartoon counterpart. They used to be the same color until the candy was recently made less dark. Whether a new type of dye is being used or there is simply a higher dilution of the same dye, I do not know. What I do know is that a small change of paying ever so slightly less for dye makes a huge difference in the company's bottom line. Of course, this slight loss of color does not cause a loss in quality for the consumer. It is the best of both world's. It's what a chemical engineer does.

Phone Trouble

     My phone is in an interesting state right now; it will only charge when the phone is off. Add this to the fact that after charging for awhile, it will turn itself on and begin to deplete its battery, and it's easy to see my dilemma. oh, and service is not so great in my room or even existent most of the time.
     Some other interesting phone stories include:

> a phone falling down an elevator shaft. Especially since that person doesn't even live in the residence hall it happened in.

> watching a phone separate the front, back, and battery in mid-air after being hit out of someone's hand by a hat that was thrown 15 feet away.

> one doofus left their charger at home after visiting for the weekend and had to get it mailed to them.

YouTube

     A highly accessible source of free entertainment comes from YouTube. Yesterday I saw a sea lion doing sit ups to the Rocky Theme Song. I am presently watching a mock news channel. We were watching stand up comedy and I soon realized that one of the people was a guy from across the hall. These videos contain content of all the random things that occur in the lives of everyone. Well, maybe not carol of the bells played on water bottles, but little babies biting their older siblings definitely happen.
     Parodies are wonderfully hilarious. Almost every song nowadays has an alternate version to it. Song mockery and comedy is no longer limited to just the discretion  of Weird Al Yankovich. I have seen the video Ich bin dein Gummibar (I am your Gummy Bear) many times in several languages. Thanks to YouTube I know how to catch a duck, properly react to rainbows, and that california girls play candyland too much.

Jim's

     There is a wonderful food establishment named Jim's that is less than 100 feet from JST. They pride themselves of being the best polish hotdog place in all of Chicago. I honestly have not had it yet. I still order their  delicious burgers.
     Because Jim's gives a discount to students, I get a cheese burger, fries, and a drink for $2.40. Jim's is open 24/7. I have had Jim's in the afternoon as well as three in the morning. There are all types of people at Jim's at all times of the day. In one hour, it is safe to say that there will be college students, business men, policemen, drug junkies, hipsters, limo drivers, and any other social group imaginable. Jim's is truly an icon of Chicago